I'd always thought that you could count on ships' captains to be a bastion of honor in a decaying world. Not so the captain of the Italian cruise ship. The most complete account I have found is here (no American site had adequate coverage - look at how much information is on this British site, and it's a tabloid, fercrissake).

Jeez. "Coward" is inadequate. Heinlein would foam at the mouth and then line up to shoot the guy.

So would my grandfather, also a U.S. Naval Academy graduate. :/ If the story that I've heard is accurate, the man who was captain of that ship was fit only to captain a rowboat with himself as the only passenger, and fit for *that* primarily because he might well have removed himself from the gene pool.

CNN is reporting that Lloyd's says the ship passed that close to the island once before, last year, far away from the intended course. So the cruise line knew about it. Their execs and whoever promoted that captain should be in court also.